Obama’s big sell on NATO’s relevance

Military personnel keep watch over arrivals at O'Hare International Airport before the start of the NATO summit in Chicago May 19, 2012. The two-day summit which starts May 20 will draw representatives from 50 countries, including leaders of the 28 members of the military alliance. Photo: Reuters
AFR

by
Roxana Tiron

US President
Barack Obama
will seek to persuade financially pressed European governments and their war-weary citizens to back Afghanistan’s security over the next decade.

Mr Obama is trying to prevent a rush to the exits in Afghanistan by US allies before 2014, when Afghan forces are to take over full security.

Highlighting the political pressures on the US and its allies, two coalition soldiers died after an insurgent attack in southern Afghanistan yesterday, NATO’s International Security Assistance Force reported.

The US wants allies, many enduring budget cuts, to help cover the $US4.1 billion a year needed to finance Afghan security forces after 2014.

French President Francois Hollande’s plan to pull combat troops out of Afghanistan by the end of this year is “untenable" and would be seen by allies as “disloyal", former defence minister Gerard Longuet said in a radio interview yesterday.

“We are putting ourselves in a situation where our European partners will feel we are unpredictable. We came in together, we leave together."

As the 28 members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and partner nations were gathering for the summit in Chicago, the effort to reach consensus on the way ahead in Afghanistan was testing Mr Obama’s diplomatic skills and also the political cohesion and staying power of the 63-year-old group.

“It’s important to reaffirm the relevance of the alliance," said Stephen Larrabee, of Rand Corp, a policy institute.

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The summit takes place as Europeans and the US are cutting defence spending and NATO avoids being drawn into the crisis in Syria, which borders alliance member Turkey.

While last year’s military actions in Libya were proclaimed an alliance success, they exposed the Europeans’ reliance on US military power like Tomahawk cruise missiles and airborne reconnaissance and refuelling.

Mr Obama was set overnight to unveil a new package of NATO initiatives that includes the alliance purchasing a fleet of surveillance drones, sharing weapons and training facilities, and sustaining nuclear deterrence in Europe, even as disarmament efforts continue with an often belligerent Russia, according to senior administration officials.

Although debate on winding down the Afghan war will dominate the NATO summit, Mr Obama will also disclose agreements designed to guarantee mutual security in an era of global austerity that include sharply reduced military spending across the alliance.

A central element of his announcement will be the handover to NATO of control for the components of an emerging European missile defence system built by the US. A radar station in Turkey will become permanently under alliance command.

In times of crisis, US Navy Aegis warships – with radar and interceptor missiles – would be transferred to NATO command.

When interceptor missiles planned for Poland and Romania are in place, they would also be under NATO command in time of crisis.

Another major agreement is that the alliance will purchase and maintain five Global Hawk surveillance drones, said one administration official who spoke on condition of ­anonymity.

Although NATO carried out an offensive that helped topple Libya’s
Muammar Gaddafi
, the campaign revealed a critical gap in the alliance’s war-fighting capabilities: the US had a near monopoly on surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft and NATO needed its own remotely piloted vehicles.

As the Pentagon reduces the number of army brigades stationed permanently in Europe, the US will pledge to rotate units through training facilities on the Continent so the ability for allied and American troops to fight side by side is sustained, even after they withdraw from Afghanistan.